LA Podcast

LA Podcast

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A news and politics podcast for people who live in Los Angeles.

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All's Smell That Ends Smell

Alissa, Oscar, and guest co-host Rudy Espinoza discuss accelerating immigration enforcement activity in LA as ICE murders three people in one week nationwide. Then, how an unbearable stench, rats, flies, and extreme heat are impacting the Lineage fire aftermath. And as the 39-day tournament ends, reflections on what LA got wrong and right with the World Cup. Three ICE murders in one week across the country: Lorenzo Salgado Araujo in Houston, Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero in Maine, and an unidentified man in Miami. The Maine murder, where a man ran into traffic to escape ICE, is similar to the killing of Roberto Carlos Montoya in Monrovia last year 14 ICE detainees have died so far in 2026. In 2025, ICE reported that 33 detainees died LA Taco reports that the San Fernando Valley has become a hotbed of ICE activity, with raids escalating. The DTLA ICE detainment facility is now being moved to Santa Ana, although perhaps temporarily As reported by LAist’s Libby Rainey, advocates are receiving upticks in calls for help with ICE raids. Attorney Sarah Houston, who oversees calls, says: "I'm so happy that ICE hasn't ruined the World Cup by doing these mass raids, but they are still doing them piecemeal and one by one...In the background, the administration is still there, and these things are still happening. They're just not happening at SoFi Stadium." ICE patrols shifted to fan zones and the areas surrounding SoFi Stadium Jets used to deport ICE detainees were also used to transport World Cup teams Sweeping changes are coming to the ICE detention center in Adelanto due to a federal ruling demanding the humane treatment of prisoners ICE promised to halt vehicle stops and increase the use of body cameras. Hmmm, where have we heard that before? CHIRLA, pro-immigrant leaders, and clergy members held a press conference to honor the people killed by ICE, and organize a day of action on July 25 85 million pounds of rotting food from the Lineage fire is now causing an overpowering smell that’s traveling far outside the neighborhood, contains odor-related toxins, and is creating a fly infestation. Extreme heat is also becoming an issue. AQMD has issued an odor violation for the smell from the Lineage fire, but residents continue to demand that the warehouse is shut down Businesses in the area are empty and some haven’t gotten air purifiers Ruben Vives reports for the LA Times that Manuel Orozco, owner of Jim’s Burgers, and his workers wore face masks inside the mostly empty diner. Not far from the Lineage warehouse, Orozco said “No one is coming and it’s because of the smoke…It’s been a difficult time.” For L.A. Material, Julia Wick tried to find out where the waste is going LA Mayor Karen Bass had a quick response to the sinkhole and water main break in WeHo Alissa wrote about how FIFA fan zones are privatizing public spaces. In Venice, the fan zone didn’t include a promised free component. Vendors were also kicked off the Venice boardwalk Metro ridership numbers in June increased by two million year over year during the World Cup Alissa will be speaking about what LA has learned from the World Cup at LA Forward's next meeting on July 21 from 7 to 8 p.m. RSVP for the Zoom Support LA Podcast by becoming a paid subscriber at thinkforward.la This week’s episode was produced by Sophie Bridges Our digital producer is Victoria Alejandro The reporting and analysis you hear in the show is put together by our rotating cast of producers and co-hosts every week. All opinions expressed on the show are solely those of co-hosts and may not represent the views of LA Forward Alissa Walker writes the newsletter Torched, tracking LA’s megaevent progress. Find her at @awalkerinla on Instagram and @awalkerinla.bsky.social on Bluesky Oscar Zarate is director of external affairs at Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles (CHIRLA). He is @straight_outta_papeles on Instagram Rudy Espinosa is executive director of Inclusive Action for the City, a nonprofit, Community Development Financial Institution based in Los Angeles. Follow him at @rudyespi
13. Juli

Town Hall Your Fault

Alissa, Mike, and guest co-host Adam Conover take a look at the ongoing repercussions from the Lineage Logistics fire, an explosive town hall in Boyle Heights, and how the thawing cold storage warehouse has snowballed into a political nightmare. Then, what’s changed in Karen Bass’s mayoral campaign. And some bad (and also some good?) LAPD updates. At a town hall in Boyle Heights for the community impacted by the Lineage fire, Mayor Karen Bass and other officials were booed by the crowd. Watch the entire thing here Both Bass and Lineage official Jeff Rivera issued multiple apologies, including admitting major communication issues around air quality Meanwhile, ER visits spiked during the fire, and Boyle Heights residents were exposed to air pollution that was worse than the Eaton Fire The Boyle Heights disaster once again raises jurisdictional issues about how residents of the adjacent unincorporated areas of LA County access services Bass recommended Airbnb to displaced residents looking for temporary housing, despite the ongoing lawsuits against Airbnb from the city of LA for price gouging after the 2025 fires. Plus Airbnb is heavily funding her campaign As reported by Julia Wick at L.A. Material Bass’ unpaid advisor Yusef Robb is also helping with crisis communications for Lineage, although he later said he would no longer advise Bass Boyle Heights residents staged a protest along with LAUSD board member Rocio Rivas to demand the removal of Lineage from the neighborhood Bass’ campaign is shifting leadership: Doug Herman is out and Julie Chavez Rodriguez, who worked on both Joe Biden’s and Kamala Harris’s 2024 campaigns, is in The LAPD officer who shot and killed a dog named Jameson during the Knicks victory last month will not be publicly named despite the fact that body cam footage and transcripts have been released, and the dog’s owner Marie Marseille has filed a lawsuit against the city LAPD has agreed to end their deal with Flock surveillance cameras Journalist Sean Beckner-Carmitchel has the LAPD-Flock MOU Become a paid subscriber to thinkforward.la This week’s episode was produced by Sophie Bridges Our digital producer is Victoria Alejandro The reporting and analysis you hear in the show is put together by our rotating cast of producers and co-hosts every week. All opinions expressed on the show are solely those of co-hosts and may not represent the views of LA Forward Alissa Walker writes the newsletter Torched, tracking LA’s megaevent progress. Find her at @awalkerinla on Instagram and @awalkerinla.bsky.social on Bluesky Mike Bonin is the executive director of the Pat Brown Institute for Public Affairs at CalState LA, and can be found at Substack, or @mikebonin on IG, and @mikebonin.bsky.social on Bluesky Adam Conover is a comedian, writer, and podcaster who hosts the weekly series Factually and created the television programs Adam Ruins Everything and The G Word with Adam Conover
6. Juli

Mistrial By Fire

Alissa, Godfrey, and Kate examine why the Palisades arson case ended in a mistrial, and how the feds biffed the prosecution. What you won’t see on the November ballot after LA City Council charter reforms go down in flames. Then, LA finally has a city service agreement with LA28, but human rights advocates are sounding alarms. A mistrial has been declared against Jonathan Rinderknecht, the man accused of arson in the 2025 Palisades Fire after a deadlocked jury Juror #4 on the case spoke publicly about deliberations, and the potential confusion surrounding convictions for a holdover fire The jury voted 10-2 in favor of acquitting Rinderknecht, and some Palisades residents would rather the effort of a retrial go into the effort of rebuilding. Longtime resident and journalist Lisa Sweetingham says, “They really don’t have the evidence to bring it home” Unlike the Palisades fire, the Eaton fire in Altadena has confirmed evidence that a century-old idle transmission line that Southern California Edison failed to remove was the cause of the blaze. Affected residents have to do the calculus between a compensation fund and a lawsuit, though rebuilds from both fires have a long journey ahead Fireworks are still banned in the city of Los Angeles South LA families remain displaced by the LAPD’s 2021 botched fireworks detonation Seven workers were killed in Northern California last year due to an explosion at a ranch storing huge amounts of fireworks owned by the aptly named company Devastating Pyrotechnics LA Material’s Jessica Garrison reports on the massive black-market fireworks operation in Los Angeles, and how the illegal explosives are entering the city We talked about charter reform a few weeks ago, but there’s an update: the ballot proposals for noncitizen voting and LAPD measures have been pulled Councilmember Eunisses Hernandez suggests in a comment that punting the LAPD measure may have been intended to support Mayor Bass’ reelection. And Councilmember Hugo Soto-Martinez says that protecting the status quo means the “city will remain broken A charter allocation for parks did make it through and will be on the ballot in November: Listen to Councilmembers Bob Blumenfield and Monica Rodriguez discuss the allocation here Is LA’s mayor actually weak? Kate thinks the charter amendment process shows that might not be true! Read Robert Greene’s piece on power in LA for LA Reported LA28 presented its human rights plan and answered questions about a city service agreement at the city’s ad hoc Olympic and Paralympic committee meeting this week Libby Rainey’s reporting for LAist notes how this city service agreement is nine months overdue and it has not yet been determined where the federal funds will go (or if LA will even get them) Read Alissa’s thread on Bluesky from the meeting Councilmember Soto-Martinez grilled LA28 CEO Raymond Hoover over ICE enforcement; listen here And what do security perimeters mean for densely populated areas and recently added venues like Griffith Park? Support LA Podcast by becoming a paid subscriber at thinkforward.la Thanks to Sophie Bridges for producing The reporting and analysis you hear in the show is put together by our rotating cast of producers and co-hosts every week. All opinions expressed on the show are solely those of co-hosts and may not represent the views of LA Forward Alissa Walker writes the newsletter Torched, tracking LA’s megaevent progress. Find her at @awalkerinla on Instagram and @awalkerinla.bsky.social on Bluesky Godfrey Plata is the deputy director of LA Forward and is @godfreyplata on Instagram Kate Cagle is an anchor at Spectrum News and the host of the LA Times Studios podcast “Rebuilding Los Angeles.” Find her at @katecagle at Instagram
29. Juni

On Top of Cold Smoky

Alissa, Godfrey, and Loraine examine the public health impacts of the Lineage warehouse fire that burned in Boyle Heights for a week. LA’s council votes to end oil extraction (for the second time). LAUSD superintendent Alberto Carvalho resigns amid a federal investigation into an AI chatbot deal as the board dramatically reduces screen time for students. And yet another ULA backroom deal turns into a win for Howard Jarvis. After one week of burning in Boyle Heights and decimating air quality throughout the region, the Lineage Logistics warehouse fire was finally out But the impact to the neighborhood won’t be known for some time, reports Capital and Main: “Short-term consequences for those nearest to the warehouse could be asthma and even heart attacks, but other effects will take time to surface. Much of it has to do with what’s in the smoke, which is hard to trace retroactively.” The smoke has dissipated but the neighborhood faces new challenges: “‘Like a dead body’: after warehouse fire, LA residents say air thick with smell of rotting food” LA Podcast founder Hayes Davenport reports for L.A. Material on a similar fire from the same company that burned for 63 days in Washington Karen Bass’s response has been heavily criticized. She was out of town (again), didn’t hold a press conference until Friday, and didn’t declare an emergency response until Saturday. Then she said the air was “not dangerous” and “There is not anything you need to do to protect yourself. You do not even need to wear a mask” but later walked back those comments Boyle Heights residents are reporting dizziness, eye irritation, headaches, nausea, and chest pain, the Boyle Heights Beat reports. “Smoke has seeped into their homes. It’s all over their clothes and couches. Air purifiers are in high demand. Meanwhile, a particle pollution advisory continues to be extended day after day.” Watch the AQI change throughout the region as winds shift Calls for accountability came from City Controller Kenneth Mejia and candidate for city attorney Marissa Roy Meanwhile the East LA oil spill last month a few miles away was actually 25,000 not 2,400 gallons? What?!? What better time to end oil extraction in LA City? The Stand LA coalition celebrates the first step towards victory after a similar 2022 ordinance was challenged by oil companies. Councilmember Katy Yaroslavsky made a great video showing how pervasive oil drilling still is in LA LAUSD superintendent Alberto Carvalho resigned after being put on paid leave during a federal investigation related to the company AllHere, which made an AI chatbot product LAUSD used. Further reporting by the LA Times revealed potential ethics violations related to gifts and trips paid for by AllHere that Carvalho failed to disclose on his Form 700 LA Podcast listeners remember a previous Form 700 discussion due to a Vegas trip attended by Councilmember John “City Staffer B” Lee who failed to disclose gifts and was fined by the ethics commission — and is now suing the city and taxpayers are paying for it! Meanwhile sweeping screen time reforms are passed by the LAUSD board which would dramatically limit how much younger students in particular spend on computers, prioritizing teacher-led instruction, and blocking some platforms like YouTube This is a huge victory for the Schools Beyond Screens advocates, who also advocated for the dismissal of Carvalho Longtime administrator Andres Chait is now LAUSD superintendent and promises to bring stability to the district Bass commented to Conan Nolan that a deal was being made in Sacramento that would stop a threatened attack on all transfer taxes if legislative reforms were made to cap them. As it turns, the anti-transfer tax measure coalition collapsed due to the intransigence of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association The final deal made by the legislature removes the anti-transfer tax measure from the ballot, so ULA won’t be affected. The entire process ended up reaffirming Prop 13 and became a huge win for Jarvis There are going to be so many state ballot measures and the ULA measure on the city ballot is still to come And due to Prop 218, also passed by the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, LA property owners need to vote to raise their streetlight assessments that hadn’t been raised since 1996 — and 80% of the weighted vote said no way, creating yet another huge infrastructural crisis for the city Support LA Podcast by becoming a paid subscriber at thinkforward.la This week’s episode was produced by Sophie Bridges The reporting and analysis you hear in the show is put together by our rotating cast of producers and co-hosts every week. All opinions expressed on the show are solely those of co-hosts and may not represent the views of LA Forward Alissa Walker writes the newsletter Torched, tracking LA’s megaevent progress. Find her at @awalkerinla on Instagram and @awalkerinla.bsky.social on Bluesky Godfrey Plata is the deputy director of LA Forward and is @godfreyplata on Instagram Loraine Lundquist is chair of LA Forward’s board, an astrophysicist, and a sustainability policy expert who earned 49.4% of the vote as a candidate for LA City Council
22. Juni

What's Cup With You?

Scott, Alissa, and Mike look back at the first week of the World Cup as LA hosts its first of many major events. SoFi’s stadium workers won an unprecedented labor contract and a huge fire in Boyle Heights continues to burn. Then: what charter reforms are going to the ballot, and what decisions — like council expansion — are being punted back for more “study.” Alissa wrote about the opening weekend of the World Cup and how the city is doing one week later. She also has a daily guide to activities happening around LA So far the World Cup seems to be going pretty well in LA One watch party at Seoul International Park in Koreatown with a huge turnout became very overcrowded and families had to leave because it felt unsafe Metro shuttles to the games — only $1.75! — are seeing surging ridership, with CEO Stephanie Wiggins writing regular updates Unite Here’s SoFi workers voted to authorize a strike a week before the first game, then negotiated for an unprecedented contract — allowing them to strike whenever they feel they are threatened by ICE. As Mike notes, this strategy of using deadline leverage instead of normal bargaining paid off and this now becomes the template for negotiating with LA28 By the way, many local labor contracts are set to expire May 1, 2028 There hasn’t been any ICE spotted around the stadium but ICE raids regionally have not stopped We also don’t know how much this is costing us. The deal LA made with FIFA has not been made public — here’s an explanation for why — but other host city contracts don’t look great Meanwhile DEA agents are conducting sweeps in MacArthur Park, which is also hosting watch parties, and Karen Bass says she’s directing LAPD to support them LA District Attorney Nathan Hochman made a video saying MacArthur Park would be ready for picnics by Labor Day while Councilmember Eunisses Hernandez made her own video saying don’t wait until Labor Day A huge Boyle Heights cold storage warehouse fire forced local residents to shelter in place and is making air quality terrible as it continues to flare up. Since we recorded, Bass finally held a press conference and declared an emergency. Boyle Heights Beat has the best updates Listen to Mike summarize the conclusion of the charter reform process on KCRW’s Press Play LAist’s Frank Stolze explains what’s going to the ballot in November, including noncitizen voting and police reform Big changes to the way LA builds things are coming with a Capital Infrastructure Program and ability to budget 5 years in advance, which would prevent us from having to give back money to Caltrans because we can’t build bike lanes A huge win for parks, which will double their charter allocation to 0.06%. Alissa wrote about why that’s good but still nearly not enough money for what our parks actually need And altering a tiny clause, 104(g), would change how LA does public-private partnerships, which could help save LA’s beleaguered zoo Council has instructed the City Attorney to draft a ballot measure to amend ULA, most notably an exemption from the transfer tax for multifamily buildings sold within 10 years of construction. The Yaroslavsky/McOsker proposal is more narrowly tailored than what CM Raman pitched in January but broader than the legislative tweaks pushed by CM Jurado’s ad hoc committee. Council will make a final decision on whether to put it on the ballot in the coming weeks. Mayoral candidate Nithya Raman says we’re not getting more reform because Bass slow-walked the process — and she’s not wrong! Veteran journalist Robert Greene offers an incredibly thoughtful explanation of why LA doesn’t have a weak mayor system but doesn’t really have a strong mayor system either Support LA Podcast by becoming a paid subscriber at thinkforward.la This week’s episode was produced by Sophie Bridges The reporting and analysis you hear in the show is put together by our rotating cast of producers and co-hosts every week. All opinions expressed on the show are solely those of co-hosts and may not represent the views of LA Forward Scott Frazier is an original co-host of LA Podcast Alissa Walker writes the newsletter Torched, tracking LA’s megaevent progress. Find her at @awalkerinla on Instagram and @awalkerinla.bsky.social on Bluesky Mike Bonin is the executive director of the Pat Brown Institute for Public Affairs at Cal State LA, and can be found at @mikebonin on Instagram and @mikebonin.bsky.social on Bluesky
15. Juni

Bass Tacks

Mike, Godfrey, and guest co-host Jasmyne Cannick discuss the promise and perils of the LA mayoral runoff between Karen Bass and Nithya Raman. Plus, the fake controversy over California’s ballot counting process, and LA’s City Council is poised to ditch years of effort to reform the city’s charter. How bad will the mayoral runoff be? The LA Times reports on a likely “knife fight” between now and November 3. Jasmyne writes that the “Democratic group chat is about to get messy” Bass kicked off her general election campaign with a broadside at Raman, indicating she intends to hit Raman on police hiring and homeless encampments. Raman, meanwhile, held a press conference, outlining her vision and appealing to the frustrations of supporters of Spencer Pratt Pratt, who promised to leave LA if he lost the mayor’s race, has apparently changed his mind. Friday afternoon he dropped a 3-minute video attacking Bass and Raman in his typical over-the-top fashion, and claiming he has a private recording of one of them making remarks that will force them to resign in disgrace Mike, on his most recent episode of What’s Next, Los Angeles, talked about the way the candidates are framing the race, and what that could mean for their governing coalitions and their agenda in office The data analysts have been crunching numbers and creating all sorts of reports on how subsections of the electorate broke in the June primary. Raman carried renters, according to Paul Mitchell of Political Data Inc. Bass dominated in Latino neighborhoods, according to the Los Angeles Times. The New York Times published an updated map of the city, showing which candidates prevailed in which neighborhoods If you want to go deep on the data, Mitchell has launched a fascinating experimental website that combines LA County 2026 primary election results with voter-file data to provide detailed analysis of nearly every race, including precinct maps, demographic correlations, ecological inference modeling, and candidate-to-candidate voting pattern comparisons. Mitchell also offers a quick look at which mayoral and gubernatorial candidates came in first and second in each LA City Council district Nationally, the pace of the vote count in California has spawned a bevy of conspiracies, voiced by Donald Trump and other administration figures — although disputed by GOP gubernatorial finalist Steve Hilton. The Atlantic has a good deep dive on the substance of the issue The conservative attacks have spawned sadly predictable hand-wringing in places like the New York Times editorial board. Yousef Baig, the CalMatters opinion editor, responded to the editorial on Bluesky: “Red states are aggressively disenfranchising Black and brown voters for the third consecutive century, but sure let’s call for federal reforms because California is too slow” This is the week the LA City Council must decide which charter reform proposals to put before the voters in November. At the moment, the body seems poised to defer most items, saying recommendations from the Charter Reform Commission need more study. Liz Chou in her daily Squawk Box newsletter, gets into it here and here Happy LGBTQ+ Pride! The two documentaries Mike mentions in this week’s show are The Life & Times of Harvey Milk (1984) and Brother Outsider: The Life of Bayard Rustin (2003) LA Forward is hosting an election debrief on Zoom 7 p.m. Tuesday, with special guests Marissa Roy and Estuardo Mazariegos. RSVP here If you plan on watching or celebrating the World Cup events in Los Angeles, the best resource available is Alissa’s guide to the World Cup, who also wrote about how this is LA’s chance to live out in public This week’s episode was produced by Sophie Bridges The reporting and analysis you hear in the show is put together by our rotating cast of producers and co-hosts every week. All opinions expressed on the show are solely those of co-hosts and may not represent the views of LA Forward Mike Bonin is the executive director of the Pat Brown Institute for Public Affairs at CalState LA, and can be found at Substack, or @mikebonin on IG, and @mikebonin.bsky.social on Bluesky Godfrey Plata is the deputy director of LA Forward and is @godfreyplata on Instagram Jasmyne Cannick is a political consultant and journalist. You can find her on on Substack at or Instagram at @hellojasmyne
8. Juni

Prattfall

Alissa, Mike, and guest co-host Marco Santana recap the election results from a wild primary season. Who are the winners and losers? How did progressive incumbents and challengers fare? And the mayoral race numbers seem to show that Angelenos will never have to think about Spencer Pratt again. After we recorded, Nithya Raman surged ahead of Spencer Pratt and appears set to hold her #2 spot to make the runoff with LA Mayor Karen Bass. Decision Desk has already called the race Mike rejects the framing that mainstream Democrats “survived” the election When MAGA loses they say everyone else is “cheating,” but that’s not the case. California makes it very easy to vote and counts every ballot — and that takes time You can view LA County’s election results, new ballot drops are added every day from 4 to 5 p.m., but the absolute best way to track what’s happening in the mayoral race is to use Scott’s spreadsheet The biggest winner of this election cycle was Kenneth Mejia, dancing on election night “feeling like 10 million bucks,” a reference to his opponent’s mom spending $10 million — 10! MILLION! — dollars in a failed attempt to defeat him Hydee Feldstein Soto is also out, the first incumbent LA city attorney to lose in 100 years. Marissa Roy and John McKinney will advance The New York Times election tracker is the best place to track state elections with more coverage at CalMatters In the governor race, Xavier Becerra moved to first and will advance to the runoff. Tom Steyer has a very small and dwindling chance of bumping Republican Steve Hilton out of the second spot For insurance commissioner, progressive Jane Kim has a decisive lead over Ben Allen who is still wrestling for a runoff spot with Republican Stacy Korsgaden U.S. Rep. Jimmy Gomez’s re-election campaign received an election day bombshell as the House ethics committee opened an investigation into sexual misconduct allegations. He’s headed to the runoff with Justice Democrat Angela Gonzales-Torres Pratt told CNN’s Elex Michaelson he would win outright with 50 percent (HAHAHA) And MS Now’s Jacob Soboroff offered a very clear-eyed assessment of Pratt’s poisonous populism and connection to Trump Alissa is honestly very mad that Pratt was boosted so much by elected officials who took him and his conspiracies so seriously Bass gave a triumphant speech on election night where she rallied supporters Raman was moved to tears when talking about building a city for her kids (which right-wingers claimed was a teary concession speech) Monica Rodriguez gave an absolutely brutal interview where she called Raman’s run “disgusting” (remember we told you Rodriguez was toying with a mayoral run) Monterey Park voted overwhelmingly to ban data centers, the first U.S. city to pass an outright ban Last month, Rachel came in second in the D Line Dash, the subway/car/bike race from Beverly Hills to Pershing Square. Here’s Rachel’s journey as the driver. The transit rider came in first, of course, and the cyclist came in a very close third Support LA Podcast by becoming a paid subscriber at thinkforward.la This week’s episode was produced by Charlotte Landes The reporting and analysis you hear in the show is put together by our rotating cast of producers and co-hosts every week. All opinions expressed on the show are solely those of co-hosts and may not represent the views of LA Forward Alissa Walker writes the newsletter Torched, tracking LA’s megaevent progress. Find her at @awalkerinla on Instagram and @awalkerinla.bsky.social on Bluesky Mike Bonin is the executive director of the Pat Brown Institute for Public Affairs at CalState LA, and can be found at @mikebonin on Instagram and @mikebonin.bsky.social on Bluesky Marco Santana brings over a decade of leadership to the LA homelessness services sector and is a former candidate and active leader within local Democratic party politics. He’s at @Marco4LA on Instagram
1. Juni

Poll Yourselves Together

Mike, David, and Liz weigh the progressive divide in the last days of the mayor’s race, the latest polls which show a Karen Bass-Nithya Raman-Spencer Pratt dead heat, and the AI-assisted rise of Pratt. Plus, some reforms are on the way for Measure ULA and voters are being asked to tax themselves with Measure ER to stop catastrophic cuts to the County's healthcare system. In the final days of the mayoral primary, a new LA Times poll shows a tight three-way race between Mayor Karen Bass, Councilmember Nithya Raman, and Spencer Pratt. Meanwhile, the CA Post poll shows Pratt in the lead Many lefty voters are wrestling up to the last minute with a decision over voting for Raman or Haung. Huang has been sharply critical of Raman and publicly rebuffed overtures from the Raman camp Meanwhile, Liz’s reporting shows that Huang’s claims to have qualified for public matching funds were not accurate, leading some voters to feel they were misled about her viability Just days ago, Knock LA revised its lefty voter guide, going from a Huang-only rec to a dual rec for Raman and Huang Mike wrote about how Pratt’s mastery of public storytelling is resonating beyond Republicans. Pratt’s candidacy has also drawn sharp commentary from Jimmy Kimmel, and has some wondering if TMZ is now becoming a force in political journalism The weekend featured a bevy of stories analyzing the race. The LA Times looks at the fraying of the establishment Democratic coalition Tom Bradley forged. The Guardian meanwhile, framed the state’s races as the “most turbulent election in years” CalMatters reports that big money is pouring into the governor’s race. One of the biggest issues recently has been Chevron’s spending on behalf of frontrunner Xavier Becerra After months of Democrats worrying they might get shut out of the gubernatorial runoff, there is a slim chance it could be a Democrat vs Democrat race after all On Friday, an ad hoc council committee chaired by CM Jurado recommended that the City directly enact legislative reforms to Measure ULA and refrain from placing a major overhaul on the November ballot. The rec drew cheers from ULA supporters and jeers from groups who want sweeping changes to ULA This comes as California voters will be asked this fall to repeal ULA entirely, as part of a Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association prop that would sharply curtail the ability of cities to raise revenue and roll back local taxes across the state. Voters will also have a chance to thwart the Jarvis measure thanks to ACA 13, which would require any ballot measure that raises the voter threshold to also meet that threshold itself. So the Jarvis measure would need to garner two-thirds of the vote statewide in order to impose a new two-thirds vote requirement for local tax increases For months, the ULA debate has been shaped by the April 2025 Ward-Phillips report, “Taxing Tomorrow,” which warned that ULA was suppressing production of multifamily housing. ULA supporters say that report has been debunked by a re-analysis of the exact data underlying the April 2025 report, demonstrating that Ward’s quantitative analysis merely showed a decrease in the average size of LA City multifamily housing projects, not a decrease in total units. RAND’s Jason Ward hit back with a new study last week A really important issue on the ballot for LA County voters is whether to temporarily increase the sales tax to raise money for healthcare programs, backfilling federal cuts. LAist has the most thorough explainer, covering how the measure is structured, the political dynamics, and what the revenue would fund Are you doing some last-minute cramming to decide how to vote? LA Forward has got you covered. At 6 p.m. Monday, June 1, Election Eve, there’s an cram session on zoom. (BYOB: bring your own ballot.) And of course you can check out the LA Forward’s Voter Guide, which covers nearly everything on the ballot This week’s episode was produced by Kristen Torres The reporting and analysis you hear in the show is put together by our rotating cast of producers and co-hosts every week. All opinions expressed on the show are solely those of co-hosts and may not represent the views of LA Forward Mike Bonin is the executive director of the Pat Brown Institute for Public Affairs at CalState LA, and can be found at @mikebonin on IG and @mikebonin.bsky.social on Bluesky David Levitus is the founder and executive director of LA Forward. He’s doing his best to stay off social media Liz Chou reports, writes and edits The LA Reporter, which now has a weekday email newsletter called the Squawk Box. You can follow her on X, Bluesky, or IG

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